


Nothing But His Anger And His Voice

by Wallwalker



Category: Homestuck
Genre: Community: bucketlist, Dream Bubble, Fights, Multi, What Quadrant?
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-05-12
Updated: 2012-05-12
Packaged: 2017-11-05 05:14:37
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,248
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/402818
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Wallwalker/pseuds/Wallwalker
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>You have succeeded in your mission to seek the Highblood, but everything about this task feels wrong.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Nothing But His Anger And His Voice

Something about this - no, _everything_ about this - feels wrong, as wrong as anything has ever felt to you before.

It is not that you have not tried to put your misgivings aside. You are on an important mission from your leader, a mission that you will not shirk, to find the highblood and speak to him about his destiny, to teach him the basics of highblooded etiquette, for if there is one thing in which you can claim to be an expert it is etiquette. For too long, Gamzee has squandered his gifts and failed to lay claim to his rightful place in society. 

You have taken care of your obligations. You have done what you can to ensure your moirail's safety; if she is willful this time and chooses to do something that you could not control, well, that is something that you hope she will not do. She is the only thing you have left on this asteroid, now that Aradia has destroyed herself; she is the one that you wish to tell the stories of your deeds that only one who has truly pitied another can tell. You can only hope she has stayed hidden.

But now... well. You have accomplished your mission, or part of it. The lanky figure sitting atop the specimen jar in those garish glasses is your target, expertly wielding one of your bows and laughing down at you, and now... now is the moment when you must be _strong._ You must show the highblood that you are a respectable troll, that you are more than able to be his humble advisor, and you cannot do that if you are too disconcerted.

His jokes are atrocious, of course. You expected no less from such a violent creature. And yet... and yet... you have never done anything like this before, have you? Your encounters with the highblood have always ended with his boorish and unironic statements that he has no right to order you about, no matter how many times you have tried to _surrender_ that right to him. But then why do you feel as though this has all happened before?

"We..." You trail off for a second - have you spoken these words before? Surely not, but they feel right, and so you continue. "Highb100d. We really... should speak about this..." 

You stop short, puzzled. You can see the same confusion in his face, momentarily, even as his eyes remain hidden from your sight. What a damned fool you must look, you think, and nervous sweat drips from your forehead and into your eyes and hair, and you do not dare wipe it away.

"Yeah," he says, standing and staring at you. "I mean, NO. You really should...."

He stops suddenly, and pulls off his rightfully-claimed glasses, staring at them in confusion. "Highb100d," you say, puzzled and concerned. "What is the problem?"

He looks at you, then at the glasses, then at the bow clutched tightly in one hand - and then laughs, high and raccous and utterly mad. "MOTHERFUCKERS," he spits, his voice swelling again, so loud it fills the enormous chamber. "SO THAT'S THE FUCKING GAME TONIGHT."

He leaps down so suddenly and so gracefully that you barely saw him fall, landing beside you and tossing the bow aside in one fluid motion, balancing easily on his feet. It is such a glorious motion, a flawless display of agility and balance, that you must fight a nigh-irresistible urge to drop down on one knee in front of him - or is that the sense of déjà-vu, again? You can't tell anymore; all you know is that whatever else you have been feeling is giving way to a less subtle certainty that this is _wrong,_ terribly so, and that you have every reason to be afraid.

"There's something else we should do," he says, voice dropping low again for just a moment, and his grin is fierce and terrifying. It is only through sheer force of will that you continue to resist the urge to genuflect. "You and me, we oughtta GET OUR MOTHERFUCKING STRIFE ON."

"I... but why, Highb100d?" you manage, then curse yourself. "Ah, I mean... I humbly must protest If you would be so kind as to allow me to speak to you there would be no need for us to come to blows. I could _assist_ you -"

"SHUT UP," he says, and you fall silent immediately, your nerves suddenly as frail and brittle as your dear departed lusus. "YOU WANNA TAKE ORDERS FROM ME? HERE YOU FUCKING GO. HERE are some motherfucking righteous ORDERS from your motherfucking BETTER." He quickly draws his clubs from his syllabus - you couldn't even see them clearly, they moved so quickly - and stood at the ready. "COME AT ME."

You raise your fists slowly, unsure of exactly what you should do. The answer should be clear; he has commanded this of you, and you would give him your life if he so commanded it. But you cannot take his, not when you are _beneath_ him. He does not need violence. He needs guidance.

And yet, there he is, clubs held aloft, waiting for your charge. You cannot refuse him. It is not in you to make a highblood repeat his orders to you. You must think of this as something other than a battle - a duel, perhaps, to prove your strength and your wisdom. A way to earn his respect, to make him see that you will not disappoint him -

"Well?" Gamzee asks, his voice deceptively soft. But you can see the fierce strength and rage in his eyes, the highblood fury that he has finally chosen to embrace -

You nod only a single time before dashing forward to join the battle. Finish this quickly, you tell yourself before reaching him. Knock the clubs from his hands, shatter them if you must, but do not do him harm. Prove your strength - the strength that you are trying to hold back, no matter how much your fists shake and your eyes sting with dripping sweat - and end this battle, and you will have earned his respect, and then -

One second he is standing there, clubs ready to strike. The next he is a blur of motion, and nothing is left of him, nothing but the smell of greasepaint as you come to a halt as best you can. You try to turn, to search for him - but slowly, too slowly, and you turn just in time to feel the clubs jab hard into your solar plexus.

You are strong, but not too strong to feel pain. The strike makes you stumble back, leaves you sprawling in the most _undignified_ way; the shock of it travels directly up your spine. Your head strikes hard stone, and you see a brief flash of light before your eyes. You do not think you are seriously harmed for it, and you can feel the stone give way under you as you convulse, but it serves as a warning. This is a serious fight.

"Poor MOTHERFUCKING little FOOL, that's what you are," you hear Gamzee say, between loud honking laughs, but from where? You struggle to push yourself up and look around, toward the sound of his voice, only to see nothing there - and when he laughs again you could swear that the sound comes from another corner of the vast room.

"Show yourself, highb100d, please," you manage, wondering if he can even hear you. "Let us fight a true duel -"

"FUCK YOU," he says, from yet another corner. "Fuck you and your stupid blood fixation." He laughs again - the sound even more bitter than before - and you feel another strike - this one against your leg, almost enough to knock you over, but not quite. You catch yourself, but your swing at the blur that rushes past you is again too slow. 

"We can have a proper conversation, highb100d," you say, and swing at another blur - this time you think you feel something, but the blur doesn't stop moving. You must have been imagining it, surely. "If only we could end this e%cessive violence -"

"STOP HOLDING BACK AND END IT, THEN!" he roars between peals of laughter that seem to come from everywhere at once. "YOU'RE SO STUCK ON YOURSELF! So stuck on who YOU are, when all your inheritance was used up BEFORE YOU WERE MOTHERFUCKING BORN and you don't even fucking KNOW IT, don't know all the NOTHING you were s'posed to get is GONE -"

"No," you say. "This... is not... _honorable._ " You don't quite know, anymore, what it is that you feel. You have long told yourself that your mixture of reverence and hate for Gamzee were perfectly natural - the reverence for who he truly is, and the hate for the lowblooded scum he consorts with and imitates. But now, for this raving creature who castigates you even though his mind seems lost, who challenges you and then flees... you don't know. You've never felt anything quite like this before. You want to grab him by his stained collar and shake him, just enough that he'll listen to you when you tell him to stop all of this and listen, for his own good - 

"No SHIT it's not! Honor's just for WEAK LITTLE FOOLS! It's for people who still think they have something COMING TO THEM!" His voice is moving, settling again. Closer, ever closer... "But I ain't got nothing no more, brother. NOTHING BUT MY ANGER AND MY VOICE, and I will motherfucking SING for you, motherfucker. I WILL SING THE MOTHERFUCKING STARS DOWN FROM THE MOTHERFUCKING SKY, and I will make my own personal miracle if it means we don't gotta GO THROUGH THIS ROTTING PILE OF GARBAGE ANYMORE -"

There, you think. The highblood has paused for half a second, and you hear it in his voice. It is his first mistake; you must make it his last.

You strike with all of your strength, as he wished - you fear nothing less will do - and catch him just as he is about to leap again. You strike him full in the face, watch the bones in his skull shatter, his brain pulping beneath your fist, the eye sockets caving in. No holding back, then - even though it kills you to do it, even though the blood that covers your hands and your face and your clothes is the richest shade of indigo, and the thought of this drives you _mad_.

He lays there, lifeless as you stumble back, your legs not able to hold you anymore. You have killed him, you think, and you pull your glasses away and rest your head in your sticky, bloodstained hands. It was what he wished of you, you think. It was what he requested. You are absolved from guilt.

But you still feel it, cold and bitter and wrong, and you think that you're finally beginning to understand; you pull one hand away from your face and brush your throat, gently touching a place that aches, that makes you feel suddenly short of breath.

None of this was real, you suddenly think, full of horror. None of it actually happened. It could not have happened, because it did happen another way - and you remember falling to your knees, the bowstring around your neck -

A sudden bright light interrupts your thoughts, and you look up to see Gamzee enveloped in a sudden wreath of light, bright and beautiful, simultaneously every color of the rainbow. You try to jump up, but your legs fail; all that you can do is push yourself away, staring at the light and unable to look away.

The light lifts Gamzee's body, dripping with indigo blood, and then - you cannot describe what happens next, and you are not sure you would want to. It seems as if the light is knitting his broken body back together, repairing the shattered bones.

And then it's over, and you blink, your eyes dazzled by the light. 

"Well, ain't that a miracle," you hear him say, and open your eye to see him laugh - it is only slightly less terrifying than before. He is different now, clad in a strange indigo costume, with a massive cloth cowl and spreading indigo wings, and a very odd sort of... you blink, then quickly pull your eyes away. The overall effect reminds you of something you saw in one of your moirail's ridiculous FLARP manuals, before you finally prohibited her from playing it entirely. If not for the aches in your head and your back, you would never be able to take the one wearing it seriously. "AIN'T THAT A MOTHERFUCKING BEAUTIFUL FIGHT WE JUST MOTHERFUCKING UP AND HAD."

"I would not say so," you say, finding your voice. "But it seems to have been necessary."

"Necessary, HELL." He stands and spits out a glob of indigo blood. "It felt MOTHERFUCKING FINE, all up and using your motherfucking STRENGTH like that. You might as well SHUT UP about necessity and ADMIT IT."

You swallow hard - you must not think about that, not then. There are no clean towels in sight, and this will require a great many of them. "I hope you will... ah... permit me to give e%planation some other time," you say. "If there is such a thing...."

"Awww, you done up and figured it out," he says. "TOOK YOU A MOTHERFUCKING LONG TIME." His grin is lazier now, more indolent than before. 

You nod. "I came to... to offer you my services. And you did not accept them." Your knee is starting to ache now as well.

"Naw, didn't know I'd up and NEED 'em. Guess you're remembering the rest of 'em about now, hmm?" He reaches for you, and his fingers are almost tender on your face - you find yourself waiting, prepared for him to reach down, to grasp your bruised neck and begin to squeeze - "SO MOTHERFUCKIN' HUNG UP ON IT," he whispers with unusual intensity, "talkin' about teaching and talking, wantin' me to take what I want... AND JUST LOOK HOW IT GOT YOU. No motherfucking honor in it at all."

"Yes," you agree. You know what he sees in your eyes now, without your glasses. You know that your eyes are white and empty. You've seen these dreams before. But his eyes are still whole, wide and orange and tinged with the beginnings of his blood color, and it gives you hope, at least. "That is... undeniably true."

"TRUTH AND LIES DON'T MATTER, MOTHERFUCKER." He backs off a bit, still grinning. "Figured dying might TEACH you a thing or two."

"Some lessons take more teaching than others," you say, forcing a small smile; it is odd, but you believe the highblood wishes it of you. "My lusus taught me that long ago."

"Heh," he says. "I always FIGURED I'd see you dead before you UNDERSTOOD A DAMN THING. Wish I hadn't been so RIGHT."

You are at a loss for words, now. All you could possibly think to do now is fall on your knees in front of him, to genuflect; you feel that you should be cross, but somehow the anger is less potent, now. You have been bested, and you will yield. You bend over and kiss his outstretched hands, a gentle kiss on each palm - you do not want to hurt him, although you doubt that he will bruise as easily as your lusus once did, not after such a battle. It might be a strange way to repay a battle, but such is life. Or death, if you are right about what this is.

"Sentimental motherfucker," he says, but there's something strange in his voice as he says it. "Fuck, we shoulda both been better friends with your sweet metal girl. NEVER GOT NOTHIN' RIGHT IN TIME." He bends down, kisses you on the forehead. His lips are as cool as water.

"Highb100d, I -"

"No," he says. His eyes twinkle for a brief moment. "CALL ME WHO I AM, brother."

"Very well," you say. "Gamzee." It feels strange, actually saying his hatchname, but you're not sure why. "I -"

"Shoosh," he says, and backs away. "Gotta go, motherfucker. PLACES TO GO. People to meet, new people - NEW LOST MOTHERFUCKERS in this motherfucking RIGGED GAME. Except now, I've got my hand on a couple choice CHEATS." His body is flickering, in and out of view. It makes your head ache, a bit. "You'd better not get yourself LOST, you STUCK-UP MOTHERFUCKER. Find your sweet little kitty and go WRECK SOME SHIT, 'til I get back -"

And he's gone, just like that, before you can even say goodbye.

For a moment, you're not convinced it really happened, until you hear a rustling in the vent above you. "Equius! Are you hurrt? Equius!"

"Nepeta?" you ask, looking up - and yes, there's something there, moving in an air duct. The clatter of fallen metal echoes throughout the room as she pushes her way out and leaps to the ground, unbloodied, although she limps slightly. "You disobeyed my direct request!"

"I couldn't let you go ALONE, could I?" she says, crossly, before leaping up onto you and hugging you as tightly as she can manage. "What happened? You and Gamzee were fighting, and he was saying all those horrible things, and then there was that light -"

"It's all right now," you say, wishing you could hug her too - would it be all right, here in this dream? But if you're wrong, and it might hurt her... you mustn't risk it. You can't. "I'm very glad that you're here, Nepeta. Although I would not be if circumstances were different."

"Stop it, you don't get to bat me around," she says, and looks at you with her own white eyes, empty save for the tears. "I watched you die, Equius! In the real world, I mean, and I... I don't wanna go through that again!"

Your breath stops, if only for a moment. (Precisely why and how you are still breathing despite being dead is an interesting question, but you put it aside, for the moment.) "All right," you say. "I will not _push_ you around anymore."

"No, you won't," she agrees, and hugs you again. You feel the tears soaking into your already-damp shirt. "I'm _your_ meowrail too, and I'm telling you that you're not leaving me ever again!"

"No," you reassure her. "Whatever it is that we are required to do here, we will do it together. I promise you that."

What can you do, anyway? You're dead, at least as far as you can tell. You're not even entirely convinced that you are actually real. But... well. Gamzee did request that you go and "wreck" things until he came back, and you did not miss the implied promise in that statement. Wrecking might not be your favorite pastime, combat robots notwithstanding, but under the circumstances it seems as likely to cause the right reaction as anything.

The place where he kissed you on the forehead still feels cool and refreshing, like the notes of a familiar song. You know it is surely all in your imagination, but it feels good, all the same. You think that you might be able to go on with whatever it is you can accomplish here, once you find it.

"Come, Nepeta," you say with the ghost of a smile, as she finally calms down and drops back to the ground. You offer her your arm. "Let's go."


End file.
